While We're Playing with the Scanner…

How could I fete dad without giving up some love to the truest fashion force of the family, my mother? Raised in Riverside, CA by totally humble parents, she was one of those self-created girls just born with style. She made a lot of her own clothes, and then did the same for my younger sister and me when we were little. My sister went on to become a designer and stylist, and credits mom 300% for that decision. (Now she's learning fiber arts and thinking of becoming a conceptual textile designer. She's coming to visit this weekend, so stay tuned for a post on her many tattoos.)

Mom's taste has always been very classic. Today, at 67, she's an Eileen Fisher junkie, because "I just don't want anything tight around my waist." But in her day, she has taken risks. In 1966 (or 67?), she showed up for a job interview at Air France (she worked in HR until my older brother was born) in a pair of white Courreges-style go-go boots. She was the queen of getting the Hong Kong tailor to knock off Yves Saint Laurent dresses and when I was a kid, I remember running my hands along her rainbow array of solid colored groovy 70s silk skirts in awe. (I would kill for them all now. Not to mention the Hermes Kelly bag she gave to a friend. MOM, WHAT WERE YOU THINKING??)

Here she is on the day of my little sister's christening. She has always known what to do with a scarf.

We weren't rolling in money, but my mother has always looked like she was. She'd never let my sister or me wear frilly dresses, which felt like the squashing of my self-expression at the time. Now I find the old pictures less painful to look at than if I had been coated in frou. In fact, my mother's kid-styling was pretty high-level.

What can I say? This is the woman who, when the time came to go uptown to St. Luke's to give birth to me, put on false eyelashes and a Pucci nightdress before leaving the house. To be fair, I was a scheduled delivery. I doubt if even she would have pulled off falsies in labor. But then again…